Dr. Matthew Hunsaker Named Campus Dean for Medical College of Wisconsin in Green Bay

Facebook / Tweet

From Medical College of Wisconsin, December 4, 2013
by Maureen Mack, mmack@mcw.edu, 414-955-4744

Matthew L. Hunsaker, M.D., has been named campus dean for the Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW) - Green Bay. Dr. Hunsaker will provide overall leadership and management of MCW's community medical education program in Green Bay, which will welcome its first students at St. Norbert College in fall 2015.

Dr. Hunsaker is currently the director of the Rural Medical Education Program at the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Rockford, a position he has held since 2004. He is also a tenured associate professor of family and community medicine.

As dean of MCW-Green Bay, Dr. Hunsaker also will collaborate with academic and healthcare partners which are key elements of the immersive teaching model of the program. Academic partners include Bellin College, St. Norbert College, and the University of Wisconsin -- Green Bay. The healthcare partners in the program are Aurora BayCare Medical Center, Bellin Health, Hospital Sisters Health System-Eastern Division and Prevea Health.
Dr. Hunsaker also will collaborate with MCW-Green Bay's community advisory board with regard to the implementation of the community medical education program, monitoring of achievement of program goals, enhancement of program visibility, and development of community relationships and support.

Dr. Hunsaker graduated from Milligan College (Tennessee) in 1990, and received his medical from the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Rockford in 1995. He completed a residency in family practice at St. Mary's Hospital in Evansville, Ind., in 1998. Dr. Hunsaker was a rural family medicine physician in southern Illinois from 1998-2004 prior to assuming his current leadership position in the Rural Medical Education Program) at the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Rockford.
In that role, Dr. Hunsaker has been recognized and responsible for Illinois's mission-specific rural medical education efforts. He has served on numerous statewide boards and charitable efforts while participating in all facets of medical student training including managing a network of 25 affiliate hospital partners and 40 volunteer teaching physicians. His more recent rural work also has also included the design, build-out and coordination of the Rural Pharmacy Training Program in collaboration with the College of Pharmacy and integrating those students into its rural interdisciplinary health professions program.

For the past decade, Dr. Hunsaker has been a consultant for the development of rural medical education programs at medical schools around the country, including Florida State University, University of California-Davis, University of Wisconsin and Indiana University.

"Dr. Hunsaker has served as a dynamic national and international resource for community-based medical education, particularly in the design and scale-up of rural community medical teaching models," said Joseph E. Kerschner, M.D., executive vice president of MCW and dean of the medical school. "He brings valuable experience in leadership, medical education, community engagement, and partnership-building to the MCW-Green Bay campus."

Dr. Hunsaker's appointment is effective January 1, 2014.

MCW's community-based medical education program addresses the need for providers in medically underserved communities across Wisconsin and employs an immersive teaching model in which students receive core basic science and clinical experience in the community. It will utilize an interprofessional team model with other practitioners, and encourage students to practice in the communities where they are training. Student recruitment will begin in spring 2014, with matriculation at MCW-Green Bay anticipated for July 2015.
The search will continue for campus dean for MCW-Central Wisconsin, which is expected to matriculate students in July 2016.